Abstract

According to its constitution the Russian Federation is a secular state in which all religious
associations are equal before the law. The constitution also guarantees freedom of religious choice
and practice. Federal legislation, as well as the legislation of the republics, should be in accordance
with these clearly formulated principles. Many provisions in the federal law on religion of 1997,
however, are in conflict with them. Moreover, in practice the statement in the preamble to that law
regarding the historical role of Orthodoxy and that of other ‘traditional religions’ is arbitrarily
interpreted to justify a privileged position for Orthodoxy and to some extent for Islam, Judaism and
Buddhism. The ‘secularity’ of a state does not entail the marginalisation of religion. A secular state
should take account of the historical role and importance of each religion. The Russian state may
legitimately award Orthodoxy a position of primus inter pares and privileges of honour in
comparison with other religions on the basis of proportionality. These should not, however, take the
form of legal advantages. Orthodoxy can perfectly well play the role of ‘official’ religion, but it
should not be a ‘state’ religion. It would be advisable to establish a system of bilateral agreements
between each religious association and the state and to create a fiscal system that allowed citizens
who declare that they belong to a given religious faith to devote part of their taxes to the financial
support of that faith.

Additional information
Notes

1 Francesco Ruffini (1863 – 1934) and Arturo Carlo Jemolo (1891 – 1981) are the most prominent
Italian scholars of ecclesiastical and canon law.
2 Emil Friedberg (1827 – 1910) was professor of canon law and ecclesiastical law
(Staatskirchenrecht) at the Universities of Freiburg and Leipzig.
3 For further discussion of the unconstitutional nature of some of the provisions in the 1997 law, see
Verkhovsky (2005), and particularly the contribution by S. Medvedenko (Medvedenko, 2005, p. 22
ff.).
4 For the evolution of legal provisions affecting religious freedom after the end of the communist
period, see Codevilla (1998, 2004).
5 See Charodeyev and Yushin (1997). Tregubova (1997) and Selitskaya (1997) think that the law
does not intend to include Catholics among the traditional religions. The same view is held by
Roman Silant'yev, executive secretary of the Interreligious Council of Russia (Mezhreligiozny sovet
Rossii) (Katolicheskoye, 2005) and by the researcher and commentator Roman Lunkin
(Lunkin, 2005). On this subject see also: Verkhovsky (2003) and Yefremov (2004). On the question
of ‘traditional’ religions, Metropolitan Kirill has spoken as follows: ‘This is indeed an important
question, and I think it's time it was resolved. It's a sound idea to strengthen the legal status of
“traditional Russian religion”. This would permit the resolution of a number of problems in areas
like religious education and cooperation between the state and religious organisations' (Istoriya,
2002, p. 9). Metropolitan Kirill has recently confirmed his views in an interview with the French
newspaper Diplomatie: ‘I don't believe that the freedom of people of other faiths is harmed or
threatened if the state publicly announces its special relationship with the faiths of the majority
populations in the country. This means that there are clear rules on state-church relations which
everyone can understand and which are easier for society to monitor. I would suggest that it would
be a good thing for the Russian state to define special relations along these lines with the four
traditional religions of our country: Orthodoxy, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism. This would enable
the state and the religious communities to cooperate in various social spheres in proportion to the
number of believers belonging to each traditional religion' (Mitropolit Kirill, 2005b). See also
Kirill's speech at the first meeting of the Federation Council's Joint Commission on National Policy
and Relations between the State and Religious Organisations (Ob''yedinennaya komissiya po
natsional'noi politike i vzaimootnoshenii gosudarstva i religioznykh ob''yedinenii pri Sovete
Federatsii) on 22 June 2006 (Mitropolit Kirill, 2006).
6 In Buryatia, for example, according to the law O religioznoi deyatel'nosti na territorii Respubliki
Buryatiya the traditional religions are the traditional Buddhist sangha of Russia, the Old Believers,
Orthodoxy and shamanism. The law was declared unconstitutional (after it had come into force) by
the Supreme Court of Buryatia for several other reasons, including the fact that it envisaged
different registration procedures for religious organisations which engaged in missionary activity.
See Postanovleniye (2000), p. 24.
7 The rights which religious ‘groups' do not enjoy include the following: exemption from military
service for their clergy (Art. 3.4); founding educational institutions (Art. 5.3); teaching children
religion within the public educational programme (Art. 5.4); acting in a representative capacity for
foreign religious organisations (Art. 13.5); conducting religious services in hospitals, medical
centres, children's homes, old people's homes and penal establishments (Art. 16.3); producing,
obtaining, exporting, importing or distributing religious literature, printed material, audio or video
material or other religious material (Art.17.1); setting up cultural or educational organisations or
media outlets (Art 18.2); founding professional religious training establishments (Art. 19.1);
inviting foreign citizens to engage in professional religious activity, including educational activity
(Art. 20.2). For further discussion see Khalikov (2004), pp. 14 – 18.
8 Patriarch Aleksi has argued thus: see Sovetskaya Rossiya, 26 June 1997. For similar arguments see
Chaplin (2004), p. 374. For a different view see Mironov (2004), who argues that the preamble is an
organic part of the law.
9 Pchelintsev and Ryakhovsky (2004) are correct when they say that ‘it is impossible to find an
unambiguous definition of “traditional” religion in the law’, and that ‘the absence of a legal
definition in the law inevitably sets up a conflictual situation in jurisprudential practice’. It is
symptomatic that calls keep coming in from various quarters to extend the privileges of the
‘traditional’ religions. The speaker of the parliament of Buryatia, A. Lubsanov, for example,
proposes introducing normative provisions for religions other than Orthodoxy, Islam, Buddhism and
Judaism; and Sergei Mironov, president of the Federation Council, believes that it is necessary to
‘regulate’ (‘uporyadochit'’) the activity of ‘non-traditional’ religious organisations (see
Mironov, 2006; Verkhovsky, 2003). In practice, representatives of non-traditional religions have
been excluded from various representative bodies, for example: the Public Chamber
(Obshchestvennaya Palata) in Nizhni Novgorod (see V sostav, 2006); the Interreligious Council of
Russia (Mezhreligiozny Sovet Rossii), founded in 1998, which is not going to include Protestant or
Catholic representatives (see Mezhreligiozny, 2005 (for Protestants); V mezhreligioznom, 2005 (for
Catholics)); and the Charitable Foundation for Aid to Wounded Servicemen (Blagotvoritel'ny fond
pomoshchi ranenym voyennosluzhashchim) (see Predstaviteli, 2006)). However, representatives of
various non-traditional religions (Armenian Apostolic, Catholics, Lutherans, Pentecostals and
Adventists) are members of the Russian Presidential Council for Cooperation with Religious
Associations (Sovet po vzaimodeistviyu s religioznymi ob''yedineniyami pri Prezidente RF) set up
by presidential decree on 7 February 2004 (text in Pchelintsev and Ryakhovsky, 2006, pp.
282 – 83).
10 See Article 206 in section 2 (‘Heresies and Sects') of the 1845 Criminal and Corrective
Punishment Code (Ulozheniye o nakazaniyakh ugolovnykh i ispravitel'nykh), in Chistyakov (1988),
vol. 6, pp. 177 ff.
11 However, contradicting this constitutional principle and Article 3.1 para. 2 of the 1997 law,
Articles 6.1 and 8.1 of the same law assert that citizens and those who ‘live permanently and
legally’ within the Russian Federation may be members of a religious association or a religious
organisation; and in clear contradiction with Article 6.1, Article 7.1 asserts that only citizens of the
Russian Federation may be members of a religious group.
12 Article 5.4 reads: ‘At the request of parents or those in loco parentis, and with the consent of
children studying in state or municipal educational establishments, the administration of such
establishments, with the agreement of the relevant local authority departments, may offer a religious
organisation the opportunity to teach children religion outside the educational programme.’
13 Patriarch Aleksi believes that in oblasti where there is a local non-Orthodox population, if
teachers and parents so wish a course relating to one of the other religions traditional to Russia may
be offered alongside, or instead of, a course in Orthodox culture. See Dlya uluchsheniya (2004).
14 Order (prikaz) no. 2833 issued by the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation on 1 July
2003, How State and Municipal Educational Establishments are to Offer Opportunities to Religious
Organisations to Teach Children Religion outside the Educational Programme (Prikaz, 2003),
completely contradicts the constitution because it violates the principle of the secular state and the
principle of equal rights for all religious associations. So does the more recent decree authorising
the financing of Orthodox schools in Moscow out of the oblast’ budget (see Moskovskiye, 2005).
15 The discussion involves many various and often conflicting positions. People like Aleksandr
Krutov are proposing draft laws making the teaching of the Bases of Orthodox Culture (Osnovy
pravoslavnoi kul'tury) (BOC) compulsory (see Krutov, 2006), while others are protesting against
this idea and appealing to the constitution and federal law. There are also various positions within
the Orthodox Church: some want priests in schools; others want the BOC taught by qualified
laypeople. The minister of education, Andrei Fursenko, is in favour of an introductory course on the
history of religion, bearing in mind the religious pluralism of the country. Some Orthodox circles
which are in favour of introducing the BOC as a compulsory subject are demanding the resignation
of those who oppose this, including Fursenko and L. Kezina, head of the Moscow education
department. One such is K. Frolov, head of the publications department of the Union of Orthodox
Citizens (Soyuz pravoslavnykh grazhdan). Anatoli Pchelintsev and Vladimir Ryakhovsky, founders
of the Slavic Legal Centre (Slavyansky pravovoi tsentr) emphasise the need to change the current
law on education (discussion on this is already under way at the Ministry of Education and Science
(see Mestnyye, 2006)) and are proposing that the subject should not confine itself to ‘traditional’
religions but should deal with all religions in a course called the Bases of World Religions (Osnovy
mirovykh religii), and that no religion should be presented as obligatory to minors. The BOC has
already been introduced as a compulsory subject in some oblasti, but it is more frequently offered
as an optional subject. According to the Department of External Church Relations of the Orthodox
Church, it is compulsory in four oblasti (Belgorod, Bryansk, Kaluga and Smolensk) and optional in
11 (see Osnovy, 2006). According to the deputy minister of education and science, D. Livanov, 58
out of 70 oblast’ educational departments are planning to introduce teaching of the bases of
religions as a voluntary course with a secular character and taught by laypeople (see Sostoyalos',
2006). For the arguments advanced by Belgorod oblast’ justifying its decision to introduce the BOC
as a compulsory subject, see Upravleniye (2006), V belgorodskoi (2006) and Roditeli (2006); critics
argue that this decision and others like it contravene federal law and the constitution (see
Zayavleniye, 2006b; Rudinsky, 2006). Not long ago three commissions at the Public Chamber of
Russia (Obshchestvennaya palata) (a consultative organ set up in 2005)—on toleration and freedom
of conscience, on the intellectual potential of the nation and on cultural and spiritual heritage—
produced a document which essentially amounts to a defence of the teaching of traditional religions
(see Predlozheniya, 2006; Obshchestvennaya, 2006b). Meanwhile ‘traditional’ religions other than
Orthodoxy are demanding the introduction of instruction about their own beliefs: for example, in
Bashkiria the Muslims are asking for a course on the bases of Islamic culture (see
Musul'mane, 2006a), which has so far been introduced only in Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan and
Tatarstan. The teaching of traditional religions in schools and universities in the North Caucasus is
supported by the commission of the Obshchestvannaya palata on toleration and freedom of
conscience and the commission of the State Duma on nationality questions (see
Obshchestvennaya, 2006a). For a range of material on the subject of religious education in state
schools see: http://religion.sova-center.ru/events/13B7455/273A135/.
16 Perhaps this is the kind of situation Metropolitan Kirill has in mind when he says that ‘We need
more legal precision about areas like cooperation between religious associations and the state and
the involvement of religious associations in schools, the army, the social system and the struggle
against pseudoreligious extremism’ (Istoriya, 2002, p. 8). Metropolitan Kirill's views are echoed in
the official Bases of the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church (Osnovy sotsial'noi
kontseptsii RPTs) adopted by the Bishops' Council in 2000 (Concept, VIII.4). The link established
here between Orthodoxy and patriotism entails the view that religious pluralism is something which
undermines society. The secretary for the state's commission for social relations (komissiya po
obshchestvennym otnosheniyam) in Saratov oblast’, for example, lists dangerous religious
organisations: Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Pentecostals, Adventists and Catholics (see V
pravitel'stve, 2004).
17 The law is contradictory. Article 6.1 refers to the right to ‘profess and to propagate’ the faith (in
accordance with the constitution) and immediately after this refers only to the religious teaching and
formation of a religion's own followers. Meanwhile Article 7.1 (for religious groups) and Article 8.1
(for religious organisations) declare that the group and the organisation respectively are established
with the aim of professing together a faith and propagating it, while Article 7.3 (for religious
groups) states that ‘religious groups have the right to … teach religion and give a religious forming
to their followers'. Article 8 does not repeat this limitation for religious organisations, which in any
case is determined by the general rule established in Article 6.
18 Levinson (1997), p. 4. According to the Ministry of Justice, a year after the 1997 law had come
into effect directives concerning religion which contradicted the federal law had been introduced in
30 administrative subjects (see Kudryavtsev, 1999, particularly p. 7). See for example the
Voronezh oblast’ law O missionerskoi deyatel'nosti, which was defended by A. Nikiforov,
consultant on interreligious questions to the oblast’ Duma, when he named Jehovah's Witnesses and
Mormons ‘totalitarian sects and destructive cults' (see Obsuzhdayetsya, 1999, p. 13), and the draft
law in Belgorod oblast’ to put an end to all missionary activity (see Novosti, 2001). On conflict
between local legislation in Tatarstan and federal law, see Ryad (2003). In 2004 the vice-minister of
justice Yevgeni Sidorenko noted that local authorities had introduced 80 normative acts on religious
freedom and that many of them contradicted federal law (see Oleinikova, 2004).
19 See for example the draft prepared in August 2006 by the Ministry of Justice entitled Changes to
Some Federal Laws with the Aim of Countering Illegal Missionary Activity (O vnesenii izmenenii v
nekotoryye federal'nyye zakony v tselyakh protivodeistviya nezakonnoi missionerskoi deyatel'nosti)
(see Verkhovsky, 2006).
20 As Anatoli Krasikov (2001) rightly notes, ‘Nobody in the Russian Orthodox Church has yet
given a clear answer to the question of how many Orthodox have gone over to “western faith” as a
result of pressure from the Roman Catholic Church. Without this information all talk of “Catholic
proselytism” is so much hot air’ (see Yemel'yanov, 2001, p. 11).
21 The texts of the three relevant subsections are as follows:
6.1: Relations between the Russian Orthodox Church and communities of Christians of other
denominations in the countries of the Commonwelath of Independent States (CIS) and the Baltic
States are to be conducted in a spirit of fraternal cooperation between the Orthodox Church and
other traditional religions, with the aim of coordinating activity in social life, cooperating in
standing up for Christian moral values, working for social harmony and putting a stop to
proselytism on the canonical territory of the ROC.
6.2: The Russian Orthodox Church declares that mission by traditional confessions is possible only
on condition that it take place without proselytism and without the ‘enticement’ of believers,
especially by the offer of material benefits. Christian communities in the CIS and the Baltic States
are called upon to unite their efforts in the fields of reconciliation and the moral regeneration of
society, and to raise their voice in the defence of human life and human dignity.
6.3: The Russian Orthodox Church makes a clear distinction between other faiths which confess a
belief in the Holy Trinity and the Godmanhood of Jesus Christ and sects which reject these basic
Christian dogmas. The ROC recognises the right of other Christians to witness to their faith and
teach it among those population groups which traditionally belong to them, but opposes any kind of
destructive missionary activity on the part of sects.
22 One theme to which ROC spokesmen constantly return is that of how Catholic proselytism is
allegedly preventing dialogue between the two churches (see Amel'kina, 2005; Korobov, 2005a, b).
23 Not long ago, for example, permission for the Catholics to open a small Carmelite nunnery in
Nizhni Novgorod was withdrawn after sharp protests from Bishop Georgi (Danilov) of Arzamas,
notwithstanding the fact that until 1917 there was a Catholic parish in Niznhi Novgorod with 5000
members and two churches and several chapels in the centre of the city.
24 Signed by the Roman emperors Constantine and Licinius in 313, shortly after the end of the
Diocletian persecution, the Edict of Milan put an end to all religious persecution and proclaimed the
neutrality of the Empire towards all religions.
25 Jules Simon correctly points out that no persecution has ever begun straight away with violent
methods, but that proclaiming intolerance as a principle ‘means justifying violence in the past and
in the future’ (Simon, 1892, p. 1240).
26 From 1998 to 2005 there were at least 52 cases of refusal of entry visa (see Fagan, 2005).
27 See also Article 148, ‘Hindering the realisation of the right to freedom of conscience and
religious belief’, and Article 282, ‘Inciting national, racial or religious enmity’.
28 Simkin (2004, pp. 355 – 56) also argues that the spirit and the letter of the 1997 law are aimed at
protecting the ROC.
29 See for example the episode in 2005 involving Fr Sergi Taratokhin, an Orthodox priest in
Krasnokamensk, who called Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former head of the Yukos oil company and
opponent of Putin who was convicted for non-payment a taxes, a ‘political prisoner’. The church
transferred him to Krasny Chekoi, a village a thousand kilometres away in the taiga, and then
Bishop Yevstafi of Chita and Transbaikalia accused him of ‘defaming’ the diocese (see reports on
several articles and press releases concerning this case, and relevant links, at http://religion.sova-
center.ru/events/13B7354/1472C11/70A54AB?pub_copy=on). On 10 April 2006 Fr Sergi was
defrocked by order of Bishop Yevstafi (see Svyashchennik, 2006).
30 On the contradictions in the 1997 law and its incompatibility with principles enunciated in the
constitution see Pridvorov and Tikhonov (2007).
31 The text of this law can be found at www.Assemblee-nationale.fr/histoire/elise-
etat/sommaire.asp.
32 On this law, see Ivaldi (2004).
33 In an address on 15 August 2005 Pope Benedict expressed the wish to see crucifixes displayed in
public places in Christian countries.
34 Recently bilateral agreements have been becoming ever more common, but they are always with
the ‘traditional’ religions and hence constitute serious discrimination towards other churches and
confessions. We should note too that these agreements frequently speak of strengthening the
patriotic spirit, and the absence of such agreements with other churches gives the clear impression
that the patriotic spirit is a quality found exclusively in the traditional religions. See for example the
cooperation agreement between the St Petersburg diocese and the Leningrad Military District,
which speaks of ‘developing relations in patriotic, moral and spiritual education, social defence,
meeting the religious needs of the servicemen, erecting and preserving cultural structures'
(Peterburgskaya, 2006). As far as Islam is concerned, an agreement has for example been concluded
between the Muslims of Tver’oblast’ and the directorate of corrective institutions (see
Musul'mane, 2006b), and another between the Orenburg government and the Muslim Spiritual
Board (see Pravitel'stvo, 2006). Jewish organisations are also involved: see for example the
agreement between the Federation of Jewish Communities (Federatsiya yevreiskikh obshchin) and
the armed forces (see Pri FEOR, 2006).
35 The proposal by Fr Vsevolod Chaplin of the Moscow Patriarchate that ‘discussion should be
encouraged on whether there are higher values in a society than the rights and life of the individual’
(see Pravoslavnaya, 2005; Protoiyerei, 2005) is thus not out of place, given that human rights are
not basic and absolute values in themselves but achieve their validity when they are related to
higher primordial values. One cannot agree, however, with other assertions by Chaplin in the same
speech, for example the priority given to the state's interests, which have given rise to much critical
comment (see Ponomarev, 2005; Mitropolit Kirill, 2005a; and reports at http://religion.sova-
center.ru/discussions/197B344/3D13257/5B241A8). In a letter to the Congress ‘Libertà e laicità’
organised by the Magna Carta Foundation in Norcia (15 – 16 October 2005) Pope Benedict writes
that basic human rights ‘are not subject to any state jurisdiction. These basic rights are not created
by any lawmaker, but belong to the very nature of the human individual and hence in the final
analysis are related to the Creator. Hence it is lawful and useful for a state to have a healthy secular
character, in the context of which worldly affairs are conducted according to their own norms,
including ethical norms based on human existence itself. Among these the greatest significance
undoubtedly belongs to that “religious feeling” in which the openness of the human being to the
Transcendent is expressed. And a state with a healthy secular nature must give due place to this
fundamental characteristic of the human soul in its legislation. What we are talking about is thus
“positive secularity”, which guarantees every citizen the right to manifest his or her religious faith
with complete freedom in the social sphere. In order to achieve the cultural and spiritual renewal of
Italy and the European continent it is necessary to reach a situation in which “secularity” is
interpreted not as hostility to religion but, on the contrary, as an effort to guarantee to all,
individuals and groups, the possibility of exercising and expressing their religious convictions in a
spirit of respect for the requirements of the common good.’ (See the full text of the message in A
Cesare (2006); see also http://www.magna-carta.it/riforme%20e
%20garanzie/0098Norcia Benedetto.asp).
36 On this subject see Dvorkin (2005) and Novyye (2002). I do not agree with these authors on
various matters, particularly when they assign various native Russian confessions and Protestant
denominations such as the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses to the category of destructive
sects. However, I share their judgment as far as satanist organisations, the Vissarion religion and
various groups of Russian, Korean and North American origin, including the Unification Church
and the Church of Scientology, are concerned. On the religious denominations active in Russia see
Burdo (Bourdeaux) and Filatov (from 2004a), and Burdo (Bourdeaux) and Filatov (from 2004b).
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